


Stay

by aeli_kindara



Series: Supernatural Codas [1]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: M/M, Post-Episode: s13e06 Tombstone
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-21
Updated: 2017-11-21
Packaged: 2019-02-04 23:58:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,503
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12782448
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aeli_kindara/pseuds/aeli_kindara
Summary: Coda to 13.06 (Tombstone). In which Castiel reckons with the aftermath of Dean's grief.





	Stay

“I’m going to go after him.”

Dean’s head jerks up sharply, and he meets Castiel with a flat stare. “We’re all going to go after him,” he says.

The lamp behind him makes the tips of his hair glow gold. He’s standing over the sink in his room, washing his hands, and Castiel notices his jacket is still dusty from the hunt. “Did you have to follow it underground?” he asks.

“What?”

“The ghoul. Did you have to follow it underground?”

Dean studies him with a tightness to his face, toweling off his hands. “Don’t change the subject, Cas,” he says finally.

Castiel blinks. “I wasn’t aware —”

“You’re not going after him alone,” Dean interrupts.

Oh. “Dean,” Cas says. “Jack is my responsibility, I — should have been here to help him, and I was not. Now I’ve just failed him again. You shouldn’t have to clean up after my mistakes.”

But Dean is glaring at him. He’s angry, furiously angry, and Castiel doesn’t understand why. “And what if he misfires on you next, huh?” he demands. “What then? Are we supposed to just — sit on our hands and wait to see what happens?" 

Guilt writhes in Castiel’s stomach. “You have work to do,” he reasons. “You shouldn’t let my failure keep you from hunting.”

“Yeah?” Dean snaps. He turns away from Cas and starts transferring shirts from his bag back to his dresser, his shoulders an angry line. “Should have thought of that before you went and got yourself killed chasing angel babies across the continent.”

His words hit Castiel like a blow, but he blinks it off. “Let me fix it, Dean,” he says.

Dean turns back to him. His face is white and furious. Castiel opens his mouth again, but Dean cuts him off. “No.”

He just needs to reason with Dean, explain himself. If Dean will let him lay it out, surely he’ll see why Castiel must do this. He begins to marshal his argument in his mind, but falters at the look on Dean’s face. 

“I have lost you,” Dean says, “ _too many times._ I have lost you — in Purgatory, I’ve watched you _walk into a lake_ , I — and this winter — I am _done_. Do you understand me? I am _done_ losing you. So — you had better _fucking_ stick around, or —”

He stops there, jaw working furiously. “Dean,” says Cas.

“No,” says Dean. “No.”

“Dean,” repeats Cas. “I won’t go.”

For a moment, Dean just stares at him. His face doesn’t move from iron, jaw locked, eyes masks. “Okay,” he says.

“Dean,” says Cas again. 

But Dean just shoulders past him and strides away.

\---

In the war room, Sam is tapping away busily at his keyboard. “I thought I’d look for omens,” he says without glancing up.

Castiel slumps into the chair across from him. “Do nephilim _have_ omens?”

“Well,” says Sam, “for their birth, yes. The lore doesn’t say anything about omens for them just being in an area, but —” He sighs, sitting back and flexing his knuckles. “We know everywhere he’s been since he was born, right? I thought I could search the weather databases, newspaper archives, see if anything comes up.”

“That seems wise,” Castiel agrees. It’s more than wise; it’s astonishing. It’s the type of thing Sam and Dean are so good at. The type of thing a being like Castiel, programmed to possess all the information he could ever deem significant, would never imagine.

Foolish of him to think there would even be a purpose in seeking Jack out on his own. 

“Cas?” says Sam. “You ok?”

When Castiel looks up from his hands, Sam’s eyebrows are contorted in concern. Another failure; he didn’t intend to mope. He heaves out a sigh. “I’m fine.”

He wants to stop there. Would stop there, but Sam just keeps looking at him, and he can’t help himself. “I told Dean I should take the burden of finding Jack upon myself. He became angry with me.”

Sam’s mouth twitches into an uncertain smile, which vanishes almost as quickly. “Cas,” he says again. “Dean’s been — do you have any idea how Dean’s been?”

Castiel looks back down at his hands. “I know you’re both worried about your mother’s fate.”

“Yeah, that’s.” Sam swallows. “That’s true, but — he’s been torn up over _you,_ man.” His eyes are earnest and uncomfortably intent. “You were dead. We burned your body.”

This last he says quietly, as if it constricts his throat. And for the first time, it occurs to Castiel to imagine it: a hunter’s pyre, flames red and raw as a fresh wound, dark water and mountains beyond them. Someone must have found a sheet to wrap him in. Someone must have chopped the wood.

“I’m sorry,” he says, guilt compounding on guilt. He should have been there for Jack, but he should have been there for Sam and Dean too. 

“He killed himself,” says Sam.

It takes a moment for the words to sink in.

Then Castiel is on his feet. The chair skids loudly behind him, and rocks on its legs; it bangs the backs of his knees when it falls forward again. “ _What?”_ he says.

“He — _killed_ himself,” Sam repeats, and his voice goes high and shaky on the word. “In the middle of a hunt. He had this injection from, from that doc who helped him when he bargained with Death for my soul, but — there wasn’t any _need,_ he just wanted to talk to the ghosts, just a — a shortcut.” He breathes in deeply, splaying a steadying hand on the table.

“When was this?” Castiel demands. He’s barely holding it together himself, now, fighting against the screaming in every nerve that wants to send him barreling after Dean Winchester and — and throw him against a wall. 

“Three days ago,” says Sam. “The same day we heard from you.”

Castiel stares.

“That’s when he found out about Billie,” Sam adds quietly. The information about Death’s new incarnation was part of the rapid update Dean delivered in the car, but Castiel was more focused on Jack at the time; it didn’t occur to him to ask. “There was this second injection, for me to give him to bring him back. Only it didn’t work. He was just — dead. And then —” he takes a deep, controlled breath — “he came back.”

For a moment, Castiel’s distracted from his own fury by the depth of emotion — the _fear_ — in Sam’s voice. “Sam,” he says quietly. “I — I can’t imagine.”

Sam gives a tight nod. “Billie — sent him back, I guess,” he concludes. “Only, I’m not sure he wanted her to, Cas, I’m really not. And then suddenly you were _back,_ and he’s been — well, you know, and I don’t know what to think. I really don’t.”

Cas swallows. He knows what Sam means. He’s chalked it up to the cowboys, but aside from when he sinks into the razor-sharp focus of hunting, Dean’s been practically effervescent since his return. Only — he hasn’t been meeting Castiel’s eyes.

Except for just now. _I have lost you too many times._

“I should,” Castiel says. Words fail him. He jerks his chin at the doorway.

“Yeah,” Sam agrees.

\---

He finds Dean in the basement, working on the hole in the wall.

This is another story he’s only heard the sketch of: Mary’s betrayal, dwindling oxygen, spells that didn’t work. A grenade launcher and a suicide mission. Another time Cas should have been there.

Dean glances up when he enters, but doesn’t speak. Castiel squats down and watches him work. He’s stripped down to a gray t-shirt, and his face is shining with sweat.

“Figure I ought to patch this up,” Dean grunts after a while, settling a stone into place, “if we’re leaving on any kind of a prolonged manhunt.”

“That makes sense,” Castiel says politely.

Dean scoots closer to the wall, laying his face against it. He’s using the fragments of concrete left over from the blast; painstakingly piecing them back together and mortaring them in. After a moment, he sighs, repositions himself, and grips the block again, forearms taut with effort. He slides it a fraction of an inch, checks again, and nods in apparent approval.

“Think you can help me add some fresh warding, when I’m done?” he asks over his shoulder.

“Of course, Dean,” says Castiel. 

They lapse into silence for a while after that. Dean lays three more stones with the same exacting care. Finally, he turns and rests his back against the wall, chest rising and falling with exertion, and wipes sweat from his forehead with the back of his hand. His skin is grimy from the concrete dust, and he eyes Castiel warily.

“Dude,” he says finally. _“What?”_

“I’m sorry,” Castiel says.

“What?” Dean repeats.

“I came to apologize,” Castiel explains. “I’m sorry I left. I — haven’t apologized for any of it. I’m sorry I failed you.”

Dean is watching him with an odd set to his mouth, and a quiet devastation in his eyes. For a long moment, he doesn’t speak. “Does it ever occur to you,” he asks finally, “that what I want from you isn’t an apology?”

Castiel swallows. It honestly hasn’t. “What is it, then?”

Something about the question feels like a step off the path. He’s somewhere new now, somewhere dark and dense with weeds, and he can’t see where he’s setting his feet. 

“I want you,” says Dean, and swallows. “I want you to _stay. Now._ Not to — I don’t want you to apologize for all the times you didn’t. Hell, some of them were my fault. I just want you to stay.” 

Castiel feels a painful heartbeat in his throat. “Dean,” he says. “I’ll stay.”

Dean isn’t looking at him. His eyes are on the ceiling, arms crossed tight in front of him, body rigid. For a moment, Castiel’s mind clangs with alarm. Then he sees the tear track through the grime on Dean’s cheek.

“ _Fuck,”_ Dean gasps, and turns his head swiftly aside, as if the change in angle will cut off the tears. It doesn’t. They’re sliding down his cheeks now, collecting on his jaw where it trembles with the effort of silence.

“ _Dean,”_ says Castiel, and without knowing quite how he got there, he’s across the room, crouched next to Dean by the wall. His hand finds Dean’s, and then Dean is gripping it tight, fingers clenched so hard Cas feels the bones of his vessel shift.

He doesn’t know how long they stay there. Dean with his face turned against the wall, eyes shut tight and tears streaming down his cheeks. His body shakes soundlessly, and his hand clasps Castiel’s as if it’s the only real thing in the world. Castiel’s muscles grow tired and his hand grows numb, but he doesn’t move, only leans his weight harder against the wall.

“Dean,” Castiel says, finally, again; it might be the only word he still knows. He brings his free hand to Dean’s face, and it hovers there, uncertain; cradling, but not quite touching. Then, in a moment of daring, he thumbs away the tear on Dean’s cheek. 

Dean takes a great shuddering breath, and opens his eyes.

Their faces are close; closer than Castiel realized. Dean’s eyes flick across his, down, and then up again, searching.

“Cas?” he says in a whisper.

Cas closes his eyes, and drops his forehead to rest against Dean’s. He lets his fingertips rest on the shell of Dean’s ear, palm on the line of Dean’s jaw.

Dean’s grip loosens on his other hand at last. After a moment, he feels fingertips curl in the collar of his shirt, warm against the pulse in his neck. His own hand rests where it fell, on Dean’s sternum. Against his knuckles, he can feel the steady thump of Dean’s heart.

He savors the silence, the stillness. He counts Dean’s heartbeats, and feels them start to calm.

“Cas,” says Dean, and he opens his eyes.

Dean is looking up at him carefully, so close it’s hard to focus on his face. He squirms slightly, then snakes his other arm into the space between them, brings his hand to cup Castiel’s face and runs a mirroring thumb across his cheek. Then he trails it down the side of Castiel’s nose and traces, just barely touching, the line of Castiel’s lips.

“Tell me to stop,” he says.

It’s a lie, of course. There are a thousand things Castiel could say to make him stop; only a few are direct orders. Most are questions: _Stop what? Why? What do you mean? What are you doing?_ A few are insults, things that would make Dean grit back angry tears and never look at him like this again. Never look him in the eye again.

“Don’t,” he says, “don’t stop,” and Dean kisses him.

His thumb is still resting against the corner of Castiel’s mouth. It’s just a gentle press of lips, brief but somehow lingering. Dean’s mouth is damp with tears and grainy with concrete dust, and it’s a revelation.

For a moment, Castiel is still, and lets himself simply process. He’s been kissed before, by Meg and April and Hannah. It wasn’t like this.

If he tilts Dean’s jaw up with his hand, he’ll be able to kiss him again.

He does.

Dean makes a startled noise in his throat, and his left hand tightens in Castiel’s shirt. His right falls abruptly from Castiel’s face, clutches his shoulder for an instant, then tracks down, broad and hungry, to Castiel’s hip, his thigh. Cas gasps, just a little, but Dean takes the opening to deepen the kiss, body curling against Castiel’s, seeking. For an instant, Cas’s hand is pressed between their two chests, and he feels Dean’s heartbeat as if it were his own.

A moment later, they both subside, as if on a hidden cue. It’s too much, too fast; Castiel catches his breath. Dean doesn’t withdraw from him, though, doesn’t move his hands from Castiel’s thigh and his throat. Their mouths are so close they’re sharing air. Castiel pivots his wrist and splays his fingers across Dean’s chest.

“Are you,” Dean breathes, but whatever words come next seem to fail him.

In answer, Cas presses his chin up, again, with his thumb. He kisses Dean slowly, deliberately. He feels Dean’s muscles tighten for an instant, then relax.

“Don’t stop,” he repeats, lips brushing against Dean’s as he speaks.

Dean laughs, a breathless, incredulous thing. “Don’t leave, then,” he says.

The laughter is catching. It infects Castiel briefly, and when it goes, it leaves a grin behind.

He hasn’t been certain of many things, in his long life — at least, of things he didn’t later doubt. His family, his faith, his loyalties, his Father; his own sound judgment and quality of character; all are things he’s come to question. Dean Winchester is not.

It’s simple, really, when Dean Winchester asks something of you, and you understand why.

He laces his fingers in Dean’s again, and says, “I won’t.”


End file.
